Slum gets razed. The dispensation of the day is blamed. The opposition tries to get political mileage out of it, and even a usually docile leader behaves like a character out of 300. Of course, to complete the picture, the echo chamber of Twitter — with its usual suspects — resonates with armchair analysis based on the first page of a Google search result.

On the afternoon of November 26, a day after Israel Camp in Rangpuri Pahari in Delhi was bulldozed over, the atmosphere in the slum is of general despondency. The women, though, are angrier than the men. Seven-year-old Rehan is, however, just happy since he’ll get to sleep together with all his friends in the open.

On November 25, at 9:30 am, Station House Officers of the Vasant Kunj and Mahipalpur police stations visited the slum and told the residents to get their belongings out of their houses — they were going to be rubble very soon. Within less than two hours, by 11 am, the bulldozers had done their job. Unsurprisingly, people didn’t manage to get all of their belongings out of their houses in such short notice.

But this is routine to Delhi. Slums in the capital get demolished as frequently as they spring up. It’s a vicious cycle in a city that’s bursting at its seams. (Every year, 75,000 people come to Delhi in search of employment opportunities, according to the Economic Survey.) A slum in north-east Delhi on the banks of the Yamuna, which was around for more than 20 years, was demolished within hours this June, without as much as a whisper of a protest from anyone except the residents.

So what is it about this slum in south-west Delhi — on the edge of one of the plushest localities in the city — that has got everyone talking?

A report in Scroll.in – the only comprehensive one on the issue – takes note of two letters. The first was written by a local Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh strongman to Delhi’s Lieutenant General Najeeb Jung, while the second was written by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Legislative Assemble (MLA) Satya Prakash Rana. The letters, examined by Newslaundry, site environmental and “terror” concerns as reasons for the administration to take action and demolish the slums.

It is important to note here that both the letters were sent on the same day and way back in the month of May this year.  So if it was on the basis of these letters that the slum was razed, why did it take so long?

If you ask the residents of the slum, they aren’t sure either what led to the administration coming down so heavily on them without any warning. Reasons given to them vary from potential risk to air-traffic (Delhi’s international airport is located barely a few kilometres away) to construction of an eight-lane highway connecting Gurgaon with Delhi.  However, there are more than hushed murmurs of it being Rana’s revenge for not voting for him in the previous elections. “He said he’d teach us a lesson,” says Reshma Khatun. Others – particularly the elder men – are weary of naming Rana, though.  “We already have enough problems, and we don’t want to bear the wrath of anyone powerful,” says Jamail Akhtar.

To be fair to the authorities, the slum in Rangpuri did encroach on forest area. However, the fact that the slum had extended so far into the forest and had thrived for so long points towards connivance of the authorities. Also, most dwellers possessed ration cards and electricity bills. “A wall or two would be brought down every month or so but we would pay them some money and they’d let us be,” says Rifait Khan, who claims he’s been living in the area for more than 10 years now.

So was it in fact the letters that nudged the authorities to wake up after years of inaction?

Head of Forest Department, Delhi Government, Tarun Coomar, strongly denies so and claims it was a routine exercise. “We don’t work on directives of MLAs.”  Explaining the modus operandi, Coomar says, “There are district task forces for each of the nine districts in Delhi, which look after issues like these.” Each district task force is headed by the District Commissioner with representatives from the police as well as the department of forest.

According to Coomar, the department had sought help from the police almost two months back to clear the encroachment as “land mafias” had taken over the area and were selling and renting land. “We don’t have the variables or the resources to deal with encroachment ourselves, so we had sought the help of the local police. But the police said they were short on staff owing to the festive season,” he says.

The police, Coomar states, informed the district task force that they could do it on November 25.  When we enquired about the standard warning time given in such cases, Coomar says that warnings were more often than not verbal and varied from case to case.

Coomar admits that though preventive action is the more prudent way to deal with situations like these, the lack of enough manpower and the presence of a politically well-connected land mafia result in the mushrooming  of illegal slums.  Coomar, however, denies the construction of any road as a reason for the demolition. “The Andheria-Mahipalpur road is being constructed but it’s at a fair distance from the slum.”

It is a balance of strict legal enforcement and a humane touch that makes successful urban spaces. Delhi, unfortunately, seems to lack both.